Faint markings to get some help

Q. The Riverside (91) Freeway between the Santa Ana (I-5) and Orange (57) freeways is a night-time nightmare. Lane markings are faint and the lane reflectors are hardly visible. Not safe, and scary as heck! Does Caltrans have any plans to repaint the lines or put in new reflectors?

– Susan Petrella, Fullerton

A. Talk about scary. This week I will be touristing in Romania, ending up in Brasov, Transylvania on Halloween to visit Dracula's Castle. I'm wearing a stout turtle neck sweater when I step off the train and never taking it off until I fly home (hopefully, not under my own power as a bat).

Fortunately, Caltrans has some promising news regarding the 91.

"There is currently a pavement-rehabilitation project on the 91 between the Los Angeles County line and Lakeview Avenue," says Caltrans spokeswoman Gloria Roberts. "Lane markings will be refreshed once the slabs that have been identified for replacement are completed."

Q. The road workers on Yorba Linda Boulevard must have been half-asleep when they striped the left-turn pocket onto La Palma Avenue. It swerves out, then back in like a wave. What gives?

– Dan Fortier, Sr., Anaheim

A. Actually, the workers were fully awake, according to Doug Park, the principal transportation planner for Anaheim.

"We were getting a lot of complaints about people cutting each other off at the beginning of the left-turn lanes," Park says.

"Around the spot where the double-yellow line is wavy, the left-turn lane was about 15 feet wide – too narrow for two lanes but too wide for a single lane. But some motorists were trying to squeeze in anyway and were crossing into on-coming traffic.

"To discourage that, we added the 'wave' to narrow the lane and to make sure vehicles enter the turn lanes in single file. It seemed to have done the trick as we stopped getting complaints."

Q. Why are the curbs along Van Buren Street in Yorba Linda being re-done? These curbs were made handicapped-accessible several years ago, and now they're being torn up all over again? It seems like a real waste of tax dollars.

– Gloria Bogdan, Yorba Linda

A. "The ongoing street-pavement rehabilitation project triggered the California state requirement to upgrade the handicap ramps," says Mark Stowell, the public works director for Yorba Linda.

"The ramps installed along Van Buren several years ago met the standards at that time. However, current standards require that the ramps have a mat of truncated domes within the ramp surface. The ramps must also meet very strict slope restrictions."

Dr. David Rizzo is a podiatrist who doubles as Dr. Roadmap, answering transportation questions specifically for our north Orange County readers. To ask the good doctor a transportation question, contact him at DrRoadmap@DrRoadmap.com.